


Finding Elsewhere

by background_noize



Category: Original Work
Genre: Other, very serious
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-08
Updated: 2016-02-15
Packaged: 2018-05-19 06:59:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 6
Words: 3,689
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5957988
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/background_noize/pseuds/background_noize





	1. Prologue

Okay, okay.

Gather ‘round kiddies. Daddy’s bout to let y’all in on a lil secret.

It’s a story.

One of misfortune and misadventure.

It’s the story of how your old man here became a crook.

Now don’t worry, ain't nothing to be scared of me.

Just a rough past here I'm still to this day tryna deal with.

If there’s anything to get of this, it’s this: _whenever_ , and I mean _**whenever**_ , you feel like criticizing anybody, remember that not all the people in the world have had the same advantages you’ve had. Remember that.

This, is my story.

 

 


	2. Episode 1

It was a bright, sun-shiny day. Birds were singing. Clouds were clouding. Rainbows were bowing. It was another classic miracle of life on God’s green earth. Nothing was going to stop me. Nothing was going to stop this anointed blessing of a day.

Morning routine followed smoothly. A lil virtual recreation, a lil breakfast, a lil internetz, (and a lil shower of course). Last minute school preparations* also followed suit.

 

*It is important to know the following background information on “last minute school preparations”: As I believe I have already explained, I go to a rather.. special school. Its location being the epicenter of a ghetto, the school is purposefully small and has a big fuss over security issues. One of those protective measures being a metal detector door scanner as those you would find in an airport. With this knowledge, it is therefore useful to note that in a recent time, some hooligan managed to sneak a firing arm past safety protocol. The suspect was eventually exposed during the school day and he was apprehended and what not. Point of the matter being: the school threw a huge hissy-fit and implemented new precautionary measures effective almost immediately, then at the time. Book bags, purses, satchels, essentially any type of container would not be allowed into the classes. Students outraged; school administration unphased remained indifferent. All possessions would have to be carried either by hand on your person. Tedious, yet a truly effective method indeed. That is all the background information you need to know on that matter.

 

There was no one willing (better there was barely anybody at all) in the house on that fateful morning to transport me by automobile to my bus stop. It would have to be yet another trip on the bike it seemed. Jaded, I consented as usual and geared up my bicycle for the journey.

I kissed the soil of my property good-bye, and I was off.

 

The breeze combed my already striking hair. I wouldn’t have blamed any bystander for mistaking me with Prince Charming himself. It was only the lack of a horse that robbed me of that glory however. I pedaled on through, admiring God’s handiwork of a sky. By the time I looked down, I had already chained up my bike at its place without even noticing. Yes. I was that good.

 

I left the bicycle parking area and walked the half-block over to the bus stop. There was a small bunch of fellow citizens occupying the little shelter. Good; the sneaky devil of a bus had not pulled an early getaway this time. I took my place among the cluster, and fluffed my shirt. It gets a little too hot for comfort when one is so dam fabulous all the dam time.

 

I began to feel my left pants pocket for my bus card. I had a terrible habit of forgetting my card when I was newly arrived at the school. Oh the shame I brought to myself and my father, for having to return home and ask for a ride; what a darn waste of gas. It was a habit I did regret indeed, but one I sure did not want to continue. As a result, I made a new habit of checking frequently for the card. But it is also important to note that I also made a habit of checking each and every piece of paraphernalia I brought with me as well (due, of course, to the fact I could no longer store them in my amazing purple book bag). I felt inside, it was most certainly there. As was, in the same pocket, my CVS card and my Walgreen’s card. My earphones and charger in my right pocket. My dollars in my back-left pocket. My coins in that tiny front-right midget pocket above the normal sized pocket. And my phone in my—

 

Wait a minute.

Now wait just a burger-flippin’ minute.

I felt. I slapped. I reached in again. I slapped even harder, yet I did not feel the rectangular indentation of a prism.

All I felt was the cold sting of the palm of my hand on my right buttock.

Could it be?

Could this day actually have come?

Was this, legitimately, happening??

Eli Eli, sabacthani!!?


	3. Episode 2

OK THIS IS WHERE SH*T WENT CRAZY.

OH IT WAS REAL. AND IT WAS HAPPENING. THE APOCALYPSE HAD ARISEN AND I WAS NOT READY FOR IT.

 

I started paranoia-thinking like: did I even bring it?? Or did I leave it at home?!?

I couldn’t remember if it even WAS in my pocket during the bike ride. I couldn’t be 100 percent sure it wasn’t in my pocket during the trip. Yet I couldn’t either be 100 percent sure it was!

What was I to do!!!!!!!!!!!

 

You know what. I know! I would call my house to see if somebody there could see if it was there or not. I went to dial the number on my phone but GUESS WHAT. IT WASN’T FREAKIN THERE. IDIOT!!!! Ok right, so um, what else could I do?

Oh ok, that’s a good idea! I would retrace my steps. If anything, if I DID drop it, I should hurry and check before it could possibly be found by someone else with mal-intentions. Yes. Sounds good. I would retrace my walk from the bike parking thingy.

And so I did. Slowly. Carefully. Head aimed low. Eyes scanning. Left and right. Left and right. I even checked for possible ranges where it coulda “bounced” to.

Got to the bike. Nothing. Nada. Not a peep.

Shoot, ok so its not here. But there IS still a whole 12 blocks of bike path I would need to check. That could wait though. If it was somewhere along there, it would be on empty sidewalk or on the roadside. I HOPED it could wait. I decided to head back to the bus stoppy thing and ask a nigga there for a phone.

 

A white man was there. He looked like he had just gotten there. He leaned on the shelter and was unstringing his earphones. He put em on just as I finished crossing the road over to them. I don’t know why, but it was he who I wanted to ask. Maybe cuz he was the one who had his phone out. To this day I still feel kinda bad for bothering him, but oh well it WAS kinda funny. I told him the gist of the situation with fumbled words. He unenthusiastically (seemingly) removed his recently worn earphones, disconnected them, and dejectedly handed me his phone. I stood right by his side without moving away to talk, it was the least I could do for the poor, compassionate soul.

I had no idea what my house phone was (but come to think of it now, i'm pretty sure it didn’t even work at the time, it had been offline for a while, still is offline) and I had no idea what my brother’s phone was either. He was supposed to be the only one in the house. Or so the only one I was aware of. So I resolved to call my mother. No answer. Called my father. No answer. Tried mother again. Answer!

 

“Hello? Mom”

“Mom look I think I just lost..”

“ I need you to call the house and ask my brother to look..”

“..yes I need you to do that now.”

“Imma try and retrace my bike path to see if I have any luck.”

“Ok ill call you from another phone in a..”

 

Thankfully, she seemed very pressed to cooperate. Thankfully, she answered. Thankfully, that music-less nice semi-young man allowed me a call. Thankfully, I was off to do some retracing. Freed my bike, got on, slapped it like a wild bronco (not really; that woulda hurt like a *****), and I creeped back all the way through my course, which thank God I was able to successfully remember. The only thing that wasn’t so successful was the actual finding of the phone. I passed over a couple sewers that gave me some very ugly thoughts. At that point, I would’ve rathered find my phone as roadkill on the street, shattered to oblivion, rather than to know someone had gotten a nasty hold of it. I didn’t bother checking the inside of the sewers, if i'm not mistaken, iPhones don’t float.

I reached about 6 blocks from my starting point, nearly exactly the halfway point to my house. At that intersection was my old church on the right, and a Walgreen’s on the left. The Walgreens I thought would be a good place to stop and call. See how the house search was going.

Front register. Old cuban (probably) lady. Told her the gist as well, asked for a phone.

“Go to pharmacy” she told me.

Ok, pharmacy it is I guess. Got there,

“hey they told me here I could..”

They, kinda confused, lent me their cable phone. The cable was getting in the way of a pharmacist and her client. #Yikes. Called the mother again.

 

“Hey hows the search..”

She told me my brother wasn’t answering. I could not believe it.

“Lemme try again” she told me.

Really? Really, try again?!

He answered, it was a three way call. My brother talked, told me there was no phone to be found. Oh ok good, I guess my mom had advised him before. I told him probable locations to check, gave him a moment or two.. nothing. There was only one thing left to do (besides of course retrace the last 6 blocks).

 

“Alright look Jair (his name), I need you to go upstairs into my room..”

“..log onto my account, password is..”

“.. go to my bookmarks, go to icloud.com..”

“..click find my iphone..”

“got it?”

 

“got it.”

 

I gave him anther moment, at this point I think I was creating a line at the pharmacy, i'm not sure how.

 

“are you there? What does it say?”

 

“ooh you want me to do that now?”

(he sounded like he was about to yawn a very sleepy yawn)

 

YES I WANT YOU TO DO THAT NOW ARE YOU KIDDING ME IM HERE IN WALGREENS RETRACING MY STEPS MAKING A LINE AND YOU THINK THIS—

I refrained from outbursting.

 

“..yes now, if this was your phone id be on it right away.”

 

“fine fine im going.”

 

“Thank you.”

 

This time I gave him less than a moment (whatever that means or amounts to).

 

“Where are you”

 

“its loading”

 

“ok.”

“Now?”

 

“it says, ‘requires password’”

 

“password is..”

 

“it says”

 

“yeah?”

 

“it says”

 

“yes??”

 

“it says here”

 

“yeeeesss?!??!?!”

 

“it says here on the webpage icloud.com”

 

OH MY PRECIOUS REDEEMER IN THE MERCIFUL HEAVENS WOULD YOU PLEASE JUS—

 

“'devices offline.. Devices cannot be located because they are not connected to the internet.'”


	4. Episode 3

No.

No..

Just.. No.

 

“ok thanks for the help.. appreciate it, later Jai.” I hung up.

No.

 

There’s no way. I charge my phone every day before school. Every day. 100%. I know I do. It was on before I left! I never turn it off when I leave! I remember!! But that was in my room, I still couldn’t recall if I left the house with it. But I do dam remember well it was charged to 100%.

 

Thoughts ran rampant and painfully through my mind.

Sewers. Car tires. Broken glass. People. Crooks. Overheating. (Or did I actually just turn it off for some reason??..)

 

Nah man theres no way. Either that shiz is RIP in heaven right now, or a person with an elementary school education even knew how to just put it on airplane mode or just turn the thing off.

 

“Thank you.” I gave em back their cable phone.

I staggered through the Walgreens. Staggering, I walked.

I was so late to school. What was I to do?

I crossed the candy aisle. It looked nice.

Maybe a lil chocolate would ease my mind, maybe even lower the blood pressure. Yes. Lemme catch a lil break, huh Life? Is that too much to ask?

They were on sale too! Perfect, now I could get two for the measly $1.50 I brought. A twix, and a snickers, yes that would be lovely.

I was outside the Walgreens front door, and I paused once more to, blindly, hopelessly, feel my pockets. I wanted to feel something. ANYTHING. But alas, all in vain. I slapped my buttock again, to feel something (or did i?, that’s not weird).

I ate to bring me some sweet delight. Screw school, I thought, I already had enough on my plate that day. One day absent wouldn’t hurt. I (resumed), contemplating. Who was to free me from this grueling nightmare?! Who was to rid the chains of injustice and misfortune?!? Who was to save me from the frigid grasp of death itsel—

 

Wait a minute.

(Déjà vu?)

Nah psyche lol

 

But wait no there WAS something. What was it??

It was, wait a minute, it was the coins. That’s weird I thought. Hadnt I just used those coins to buy these two................................

 

OH. MY. GOOD GOD.

DID I REALLY JUST. WALK OUTTA THERE. WITH THESE THINGS. WITHOUT. PAYI—

OH MY GOSH WHAT DO I DO WHAT DO I DO?!?!!?

 

Holy St. Peter of Alaska how the hell did I end up doing that?? And how come those security alarm beepy thingies didn’t sound?????? Wait.. DID I pay for them????! No I didn’t, I don’t remember going back to the register at all!! Uh oh I really done goofed this time. And to make matters worse.. I ATE ONE OF THEM ALREADY.

That’s it, im so done, I am officially irredeemable. I started panicking, should I leave now?! Or should I go back and CONFESS?!!? Oh my gosh what do I do!! The following* then had the nerve to happen.

 

*It is kinda nice to note, that at this time, I had, what you would call a— well actually idk what it’s called, im pretty sure it has a nice fitting name and all but I just have no clue.. Well whatever, you know in cartoons how on a character, when hes in the middle of a conflict ordeal type of thing, the angel pops up on one shoulder and the devil guy on the other? Well yeah, that thing happened. Lucy (Lucifer, as I like to call him) was all like *raspy skater voice*

“yoooo my boii you can leave now and save yourself an epik nice buck fifty B)”

and then the angel was all *tinkerbell fairy voice*

“no child, you must go back and face your mistake and fulfill the law and the prophets and flee from temptation and not conform to the patterns of this world an—”

OK OK FINE I GET it, YOU WIN. HAPPY?

 

I brushed them off my shoulders and proceeded to start digging into the garbage bin to look for the snickers wrapper I threw away. Mind you, this was still at the walgreens front door, im pretty sure someone or two saw me and assumed me a fabulously dressed homeless youth.

I found it after blood, sweat, and tears, and I faced the door.

 

This was really about to happen. I was really about to go back in.


	5. Episode 4

“Um look, you know how I told you about losing my phone right? Well I guess my head must be jumbled from all this and so I must’ve accidentally..”

 

I went on to tell the same old cuban lady at the front register how much of an idiot I was as I laid the twix and the snickers wrapper on the counter. She seemed perplexed, almost as if she caught her widow-maker of a husband in bed with an unknown species of animal. I tried to clarify, but with little success. This was all in Spanish (btw). And we all know how incompetent I am at that language, even though I totally shouldn’t be. By some miracle, which im still trying hard to convince myself to believe to this very day, I suppose she actually got the gist of what was sputtering out of my mouth. She was like,

 

“ok then you wanna pay for it?”

in the most infuriatingly nonchalant way imaginable that I almost wanted to punch her.

 

“Yes i do, im sorry”

so I was like hell yeah imma pay for this shiz why'd ya think I came back in the first place. I gave her the cursed coins that I woulda been better off not bringing at all in the first place, and I reached into my back pocket for my dolla—

 

are

you

fing

kidding me

 

nah bro this is too far. adding insult to injury. nO, NOT EVEN.

This I like adding insult to injury to death to a**-wiping.

WHAT THE FRICK. WHY. WHY MUST THE GOOD DIE YOUNG.

 

I felt my pockets (all of them) just long enough for her to noticeably notice. She did, and I gave her the stupidest string of words I coulda ever probably ever given to a mortal ever in my entire life (ever). Im surprised her ears didn’t start bleeding like Niagara Falls up in there.

 

“uh.. it seems.. that I don’t have a, um, a dollar either.. I think.. it musta.. um.. fallen as well.. with the, uhh, phone…”

 

she looked blank

like: dead blank.

 

“so um, what happens now?”

*nervous chuckle*

(could hardly even be considered a chuckle though honestly)

 

Nothing, she didn’t say a word and just started walking away from the register.

 

My thoughts: that’s it im screwed this lady bout to dun call up the police up in here. She gon fight me herself get me in a strangle hold or something. Think I can take her? Probably not. Shoot, should I dip now? Just f it? Nah, im pretty positive this is where I die.. Yup im gonna die.. here.. in a Walgreens.

 

Do you know what she did?

Do you really wanna know what she did??

Oh cuz ill tell you what she did.

Ill dam straight tell you what she did.

 

She circled around the register, and placed the twix back where it belonged.

 

“so… now what?”

 

“Now nothing. Nothing really.”

 

“wait what do you mean”

 

“You said you dont have the money right? Well there's nothing to do about it then.”

 

Again she said it with that absolutely putrid nonchalance as she walked back to her place behind the register. She settled as if nothing had happened. I could not believe what I was living. This time, I really did want to punch her in the face..

 

and so I did.


	6. Episode 5

Okay maybe i didn't actually hit her. Well at least not in this reality. In an alternate universe, i actually did straight up cold-cock her senseless. Smacked her back into 1804. (but that's another story for another time)

 

In this God-forsaken timeline, the only thing smacked senseless was my perception of life itself. I was utterly and irreparably dumbfounded. Somehow.. i managed to speak something that was actually of use to the situation at hand. Finally, something that made sense, or so i wanted to believe it did.

 

"I-- i live right there.. like i could go and be back in 5 minutes with a dollar"

 

*blank face*

 

"..any chance, uh, i could do that¿?"

 

(thank God she said SOMETHIN instead of just staying quiet)

"i guess if you want"

 

¿¿I guess if you want??!?? This lady was an official loon.

 

CONFLICT RESOLUTION OF THE STORY BEING: retraced home, nothing, got home, told my brother the story, he laughed at me, got dollar, went back, retraced to double-check, got there, LADY WASNT EVEN THERE, another lady, i was like, "YOU MAKE SURE THE OLD HAG THAT WAS WORKING HERE KNOWS I BROUGHT THE MONEY BACK", she agreed, probably thought i was crazy, went back home, got there, got mad at life, insulted it, pretty bad actually, told it it could go kill itself in a another dimension for all i cared, calmed down, called Apple actually, they told me i could go touch myself in a corner if it made me feel any better for all they cared, hung up, wasn't surprised, stayed home, screw school, screw that, screw this, screw the World Orphanage Organization, went to sleep (i think), probably dreamed of using my phone for the last time, musta been nice.

 

Musta been sad too.

 

Dreamed of locking it. Unlocking it.

Dreamed of charging it. Uncharging it.

Dreamed of putting the perfect lock screen. Of finally putting a dam passcode.

Of checking Julian's latest instagram Ultra post. Of Amanda's collage of "new gym" workout selfies.

Of writing the cleverest 140-character passive-aggressive tweet i could think of. Of playing Candy Crush to deal with dangerous levels of social anxiety.

 

But most of all, what i dreamed of most; what i really didn't want to wake up from..

Was the ever-present invisible shackles of the phone's steel cold grasp on my fingers and eyes. Of its unrelenting hold on the undivided attentions of my mind. Of its irresistibly sweet temptations attending to my every whim. Of its insanely jealousy-ridden control-freak possessiveness over my submission of an existence.

 

It was all..... fascinatingly revealing, to say the least.

But then the inevitable came, and it came to do what it came to do with all the other happy-go-lucky sleepers of the world:

 

I kissed the soil of my dream world good-bye, and i was off.

 

 

***

 


End file.
